


The Plan

by AngeNoir



Category: Now You See Me (2013)
Genre: Birthday Fluff, Fluff, Gen, Slice of Life, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-20
Updated: 2014-12-20
Packaged: 2018-03-02 11:25:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2810459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngeNoir/pseuds/AngeNoir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack's like a puppy, bouncing around Daniel, and Henley feels sorry for him one time when he tries to speak to Daniel and Daniel brushes him away. Jack, however, is hiding something.</p>
<p>Henley's determined to find out what it is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Plan

**Author's Note:**

  * For [withoutmaps](https://archiveofourown.org/users/withoutmaps/gifts).



> I hope this is okay!

“Look, I’m a little busy, so why don’t you go bother Merritt or Henley, okay?”

Henley looked up to see Jack duck his head. “Yeah, sure,” he mumbled, backing away from Daniel’s desk and nearly overturning the stack of books and papers that had lived on that chair for the past two or three months.

They were only a month and a half away from their chosen launch date, when everything would start and they’d either pull off the world’s greatest heist known to mankind or be arrested and locked away for the rest of their lives. Living together at the beginning hadn’t been easy to begin with; now, closer to the end of it, Daniel was insufferable. Merritt at least didn’t act like he was the world’s smartest human being, which made him easier to hang out with, but the two of them rarely spoke with Jack. Jack hero-worshipped Daniel to an almost dangerous degree, Henley felt, and it made her wary of trusting Jack with much. Anyone who didn’t see Daniel’s faults either didn’t see them as faults or had them themselves, and she had realized just what a blessing it had been to have Daniel cut her out those years ago.

But Jack looked like a kicked puppy. The four of them would soon be stage performers, big dogs, but out of the four of them it was really only Jack who was apprehensive about that part. If they were a family, grudgingly thrown together, she figured, Jack was the little brother who was both annoying and unsure – an almost fatal combination for performers whose livelihood depended on confidence and charm.

“What’s up, Jack?” she asked.

She and Jack had a good relationship, she felt, even if she rarely talked with him and he with her. They respected each other and he deferred to her; they worked well together and Jack was eager to do quite a lot of work. He was also really talented – show him a trick, and he could replicate it almost immediately. It meant that he was much less annoying than he could be.

Jack paused, startled, and looked around a moment before hitching a shoulder. “It’s nothing, I mean – I just wanted Daniel’s opinion on something.”

His shifty behavior had her narrowing her eyes. Something was up, and she wasn’t sure if she’d like it or not. After a few minutes of awkward silence, she closed her book and gestured him to come over. “I know Daniel’s our lord and master,” she said dryly, “but maybe I can look at it and let you know my thoughts.”

Jack gnawed his lip before shrugging and sitting down. He began to outline an escape scenario, which he actually had pretty well thought-out. Then again, he was the only one out of the four of them who regularly had to practice being quick on his feet when his cons didn’t always work out. Though that was more due to the fact that he was a street kid, a kind of busker who tried to do tricks for enough money to eat, it was still something they’d never considered.

She had very little to really offer, but she did her best to ask the hypotheticals she could think of and build countermeasures and the like. Escape scenarios, it seemed, never went well unless they went directly according to plan, which often meant initiating a scenario where it was in their prey’s best interest to pursue at that moment.

“You can’t prepare for all possibilities and variations, only the ones you think up and plan out,” Jack said as he stood up, rubbing the back of his neck. “So you need to ensure that your opponent only ever thinks to do the ones you’ve already thought of. If they surprise you it means you missed something they could use.”

“That’s pretty great, and I like what you discussed. Daniel’s got a stick up his butt right now, but I’m sure Merritt would listen, if you want to see if anyone has a different scenario they can think up for that situation,” she offered, but when he nodded and left, she watched him go with narrowed eyes. That was on his mind, sure, but it definitely wasn’t what he wanted to talk to Daniel about. She wasn’t sure what he was hiding from her, or why he’d do it, but she was determined to get to the bottom of it if it took her the rest of their planning time.

***

“You’ve been a little distracted recently,” Merritt murmured as they packed up their tools and prepared for the initial stage – securing Tressler’s support and getting their first appearance planned out. Their hope was that Tressler would put them in Las Vegas, where all the big acts went, but they had contingencies planned for other stages and situations. Now, they just needed to approach Tressler and get him to sponsor them – and, as much as she hated to admit it, Daniel would do well. They’d looked at multiple videos of press conferences and the like, and Daniel and Merritt had Tressler’s personality down. They’d do the talking, Jack would look sweet and innocent, and Henley would look earnest – and they’d pull out some tricks and wow Tressler enough that he would consider their offer of a partnership.

“A little. Jack’s hiding something,” she said easily, folding the compartment down and beginning to stack her personal tools on top – toothbrush, laptop, phone charger.

Merritt looked over at where Jack was surrounded by stuff, mumbling to himself as he selected his cards and his scarves. “ _Jack_?”

“I know, right? I’ve tried asking right out, listening to his conversations with Daniel, I’ve tried shadowing him once or twice when he left—”

Merritt snorted. “Our Jack couldn’t harm a fly.”

“I think you underestimate him,” she grunted, shoving a pair of boots down the side and eyeing the trunk to see if she could fit a bit more in. “On top of that, I’m sure it’s not… not something _dangerous_ , but any secret could be, you know?”

“I know,” Merritt sighed. “You worry too much, you know that?”

“You guys don’t worry enough,” she shot back quickly, deciding that she had two more large trunks and one suitcase; she wouldn’t need to put anything more in this one. “All of you think this is going to go so smoothly and no one is even considering anything else—”

Merritt put up his hands. “Look, if it matters that much, we can go to him and ask. Or Daniel. We can ask Daniel; Jack wouldn’t keep it from him.”

Henley eyed Merritt closely, not sure whether she ought to be put off by his patronizing tone or relieved that he was at least going to try and help her make it right. “Alright, fine. Let’s go.”

Heaving a sigh, Merritt stood up and winced at the cracking of his knees and back. “Don’t you say anything,” he warned as she snickered a little at his old bones.

“Why would I say anything?” she asked. “Just because your bones are old enough to speak…”

“Some things you just don’t tell a virile young man,” he said back archly, haughty and teasing all in one breath.

They walked down the stairs to the lower apartment where they had their actual living quarters, not the working space upstairs, and Henley knocked on the door – Daniel regularly shut them out because he was a major diva.

Alright, he shut them out because he claimed he needed time to think alone, but she was pretty sure he was overreacting to their noise level. They weren’t _that_ bad – Daniel was just that bad at keeping things together when people could distract him.

“Daniel? Daniel, open the door. This is getting ridiculous.”

“It’s open!” Daniel called, voice muffled.

Grumbling under her breath, she shoved the door opened and stopped to gape in astonishment.

“Happy birthday, Henley-girl,” Merritt teased, walking past her into the rooms. “I know we missed it by about a week, but you have to admit things have been pretty hectic around here.”

“We didn’t celebrate anyone else’s!” she gasped, looking around at the streamers and the giant cake in the middle of the room. “Why—”

“Well, Merritt’s is actually two weeks from now, so his hasn’t passed yet. And I asked for nothing to happen on my birthday. So, you know…,” Daniel shrugged, smiling at her a little shyly.

She turned around to see Jack in the doorway, shoulders hunched a little as he tried to make himself smaller. “I have you to thank for this, don’t I?” she asked. “These boneheads behind me wouldn’t have thought to ask.”

“I’m pretty good with computers,” Jack said, sounding like he was apologizing. “I know your guys’ birthdays and I just – wanted to do something. Small. But we can go out for some dancing and drinking later, you know? Take a short break. We have the time, and we deserve it.”

She smiled warmly. “I’d like that,” she said. “Thank you.”


End file.
